York County, VA Noise Ordinances: Aircraft Noise (2026)

Section 16-19.5, 'Exceptions,' lists categories of sound the Board of Supervisors placed outside the reach of the county's noise ordinance. Subsection (g) states plainly that Sections 16-19.2 and 16-19.3 'shall have no application to any sound generated by' locomotives, other railroad equipment, and aircraft. That means neither the specific-conduct prohibitions in Sec. 16-19.2, such as the amplified-sound and mechanical-noise rules, nor the numeric decibel tables in Sec. 16-19.3 can be used to cite aircraft noise anywhere in the county, including areas near Naval Weapons Station Yorktown, Camp Peary, or general-aviation activity.

The exemption sits alongside eleven other categories in Sec. 16-19.5, including military activities of the Commonwealth or the United States (subsection (c)), parades and public commemorative events (subsection (a)), and law-enforcement, fire and emergency vehicle sirens and horns (subsection (d)). The Board of Supervisors adopted the exceptions by Ord. No. 10-8(R-1) on January 18, 2011, the same ordinance that created the noise article. Because aircraft operations generally fall under federal preemption and Federal Aviation Administration authority in any event, the county's local carve-out avoids a conflict the county could not resolve through its own police power.

Residents troubled by aircraft noise near the Naval installations or York County's civilian air traffic have no local noise-ordinance remedy; a complaint would need to go through the installation's community relations office or federal channels rather than the York County Sheriff's Office, which otherwise enforces the noise ordinance.